Aa
ARS Symptoms or Paraniod
I am a white hetero male and Hypocondriac. The past year I have had 3 - 4 one-night stand encounters. Most recently I had one about 5 weeks ago. A girl I met in a bar and we had unprotected sex. A few days later, I skinned my leg pretty badly on an indoor recreation facility playing indoor football. I didnt clean it too thoroughly and soon devleoped cellulitis. My groin lymph nodes were swollen and i had body aches. I was prescribed Bactrim and took the full course of antibiotics. 4 days into taking the Bactrim i started to get congested in my head. I took an antihistamine for allergies which cleared my head..I soon developed sore neck muscles in the next couple of days. The final day of taking the Bactrim i had sore neck muscles on both sides and i started to get a rash which started at my ankles and soon spread over my entire body. The rash itched. I went to the doc and they said it was a reaction to the Batrim, but I had taken the Bactrim for 10 days...I was given a steriod and the neck pain went away immediately while the rash faded after a couple days and is almost totally gone after a week...
Now, is it possible that these are ARS symptoms from the sexual encounter i had about 3-4 weeks prior to these symptoms happening? I never had a fever. I did feel a lttle run down but I was still able to go to the gym and work out normally. I have freaked myself out about this and got an HIV Test yesterday...I will get the results in 2 days. Thanks
Now, is it possible that these are ARS symptoms from the sexual encounter i had about 3-4 weeks prior to these symptoms happening? I never had a fever. I did feel a lttle run down but I was still able to go to the gym and work out normally. I have freaked myself out about this and got an HIV Test yesterday...I will get the results in 2 days. Thanks
I really appreciate your response. This does a lot to assure my worriness. I will do the syphillis test as well. Thanks
MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL
Welcome to the HIV forum.
Your symptoms really don't even hint at HIV. Allergic rashes usually itch and the skin rash of ARS never does. Any drug can cause an allergic skin rash, but the sulfa drugs -- of which Bactrim is one -- do so more often than any other. And a health care provider ahs examined and reassured you. The other symptoms don't sound any more like HIV/ARS than the rash does. Finally, assuming you are in the US or other industrialized country, the chance any of your sex partners had HIV is very low (probably less than 1 in 1,000).
That said, it's pretty dumb for anyone to have unprotected sex in one-night stands with bar pick-ups. Even if the HIV risk is statistically extremely low, it isn't zero; and the chance of other STDs is very high. But in this case, even STDs aren't likely to be an issue, since Bactrim would cure or prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea, and nongonococcal urethritis (NGU), the three most likely STDs in this situation. But not syphilis, so if not done when you had the HIV test, you might call the provider and see if they can run a syphilis test on the same specimen.
In any case, you can expect the HIV test to be negative. But I do hope you'll start getting into a safer sexual lifestyle. Buy some condoms and keep them handy.
Regards-- HHH, MD
Your symptoms really don't even hint at HIV. Allergic rashes usually itch and the skin rash of ARS never does. Any drug can cause an allergic skin rash, but the sulfa drugs -- of which Bactrim is one -- do so more often than any other. And a health care provider ahs examined and reassured you. The other symptoms don't sound any more like HIV/ARS than the rash does. Finally, assuming you are in the US or other industrialized country, the chance any of your sex partners had HIV is very low (probably less than 1 in 1,000).
That said, it's pretty dumb for anyone to have unprotected sex in one-night stands with bar pick-ups. Even if the HIV risk is statistically extremely low, it isn't zero; and the chance of other STDs is very high. But in this case, even STDs aren't likely to be an issue, since Bactrim would cure or prevent chlamydia, gonorrhea, and nongonococcal urethritis (NGU), the three most likely STDs in this situation. But not syphilis, so if not done when you had the HIV test, you might call the provider and see if they can run a syphilis test on the same specimen.
In any case, you can expect the HIV test to be negative. But I do hope you'll start getting into a safer sexual lifestyle. Buy some condoms and keep them handy.
Regards-- HHH, MD
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